The Monitoring Officer to report on the receipt of any questions, representations and statements of case submitted in accordance with the Council’s procedures.
Minutes:
The Monitoring Officer reported that no representations and statements of case had been submitted in accordance with the Council’s procedures.
Councillor Singh had submitted a question which the Chair had agreed to consider as an item of Any Other Urgent Business. The Chair’s intention to do this and the text of the question submitted by Councillor Singh had been circulated to Members prior to the meeting.
Councillor Singh’s question was as follows:-
“Will the Chief Executive of University of Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust make a full statement to this Commission on the financial position affecting the current budget of UHL, the organisational fiscal controls in place and the steps undertaken to support the budget deficit to safeguard the current and future health service provisions to patients and the public.”
Mr John Adler, Chief Executive, University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (UHL) submitted a report which included a staff briefing dated 17 December 2013 issued by the Trust and a copy of the 2013/14 financial report by the Trust’s Director of Finance and Business Services submitted to the Trust Board on 20 December 2013.
Mr Adler commented that:-
· The Trust had consistently reported losses through the current financial year based upon an underlying deficit of £15m at the start of the year.
· The underlying underspend has resulted from increased emergency activity, investment in additional nurses following a review of ward staffing levels and had incurred transformation costs without receiving any additional revenue support.
· The revised forecast was now a deficit of £38.5m at the end of the current financial year.
· An application would be made to the Department of Health for a loan to fund the deficit.
· There were a number of Trusts and CCG’s facing financial pressures.
· The Trust had put in place measures to bring the Trust back into financial balance in the next 3-5 years.
· The measures that had been put in place would not impact upon services or cash flows and the Trust had not been asked to increase the level of savings for the next financial year.
· The savings would be achieved by avoiding unnecessary expenditure and not incurring any further discretionary capital costs as well as reducing expenditure on goods etc.
· The current proposals for the site reconfiguration designed to make the clinical services more sustainable and efficient would still be pursued.
· There was also a £45m Cost Improvement Programme underway for next year.
· The Better Care Together Programme together with the development of the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland 5 year financial plan, would also deliver large scale changes in the delivery of service in primary, community and secondary care.
Councillor Singh’s supplementary question asked what assurances could be given that given the current financial situation:-
· There would be no reduction in front line services,
· There would be no reduction in front line staff; and
· The measures implemented to eliminate the deficit could be achieved.
In response, Mr Adler stated that the Trust had a statutory responsibility to ‘break even’ year on year over a 3 year period or in exceptional circumstances over a 5 year period, and it was considered that this could be achieved. All NHS Trusts had to provide a 4.5% efficiency saving in 2014/15 and the Trust had increased this to 6% in order to resolve the deficit.
In addition, there had been rigorous quality impact and safety assessments on the proposals, reductions in staff numbers would only be implemented if the services could operate with the same levels of quality at improved efficiency levels. The Cost Improvement Programme was considered to be achievable and the Trust’s performance in delivering the programme would be subject to external monitoring. The proposals to reconfigure Accident and Emergency facilities were supported by capital funding and would not affect the current revenue deficit.
Mr Adler was thanked for his attendance and responses to the questions.